Focus Microwaves

Electro Rent Europe is a world partner for Focus Microwaves tuners, software, fixtures and accessories.

Focus Microwaves’ automated, multi-harmonic and manual tuners, test fixtures, calibration kits and more are available for purchase or rental from Electro Rent. Focus products are used in applications including Load Pull, Pulsed IV, Modeling and Noise Measurements.

Focus Microwave has pioneered the development of tuner technology for Load Pull, Harmonic Load Pull and Noise Measurements. The company’s products cover the widest frequency range with fundamental tuners available from 10MHz up to 65GHz. This allows you to cover multiple standards with one tuner. For Harmonic Load Pull, the Focus MPT tuner allows you to easily calibrate and tune harmonics.

With their recent acquisition of Mesuro and the assets of Auriga Microwave Pulsed IV and Bias Tee business, Focus Microwaves can offer a full spectrum of test solutions.

Load Pull

Load-pull is the most commonly used method for RF and microwave power amplifier (PA) design, transistor characterization, semiconductor process development, and ruggedness testing. RF designers use load pull to determine the optimum impedances of an active device for parameters like output power, gain, efficiency, intermodulation and many others. A major challenge in measuring and modelling is in reproducing a device's nonlinear performance. This makes a linear and efficient device-based PA design extremely difficult to achieve. With Focus tuners you can create successful first pass designs, which means shorter design cycles and a more predictable introduction to market.

Pulsed IV

Current-voltage characteristics (IV characteristics) are critical in understanding the performance of any active device. Standard DC-IV curves plot drain current against voltage for various gate voltages. A DC bias applied to a transistor can result in device self-heating. By pulsing the bias with a sufﬁciently short duty cycle, the resulting IV curves will represent the transistor characteristics for quasi-isothermal operating conditions.

Pulsed measurements of IV characteristics involve the application of a pulsed bias voltage to the device-under-test. The Focus Modular Pulsed IV (MPIV) system is available as a completely integrated or modular solution.

Noise

The characterization of noise within a device is critical for all RF designers. Noise measurements seek to quantify the amount of signal-to-noise degradation caused by an amplifier or other device. Noise is usually measured in a 50-ohm environment but will vary depending upon the source impedance presented to the device. The variations in noise due to changes in impedance can be characterized by using a network analyzer, a noise source and an external tuner to vary the impedance. Focus tuners can be used in all types of noise measurement systems.